Tile



Jan. 18, 1938. Q O STEUER 2,105,895

TILE Original Filed March 5, 1936 IN YEA TOP:

Orr-o A. STE U571,

Patented Jan. 18, 1938 UNITED STATES TILE Otto A. Steuer, Los Angeles, Calif., assignor to 0. H. Kruger, San Marino, Calif.

Application March 5,

1936, Serial No. 67,200

Renewed June 23, 1937 2 Claims.

This invention relates to articles that are used to cover surfaces, such as walls and floors, or for any ornamental purpose over structures that are otherwise rough and unattractive but to which such tiles may be applied.

One of the objects of this invention is to provide a tile that can be forced upon a surface without leaving any air-pockets.

Another object is to provide a tile that permits air or surplus material to escape while the tile is forced into place.

Another object is to provide a tile that will form a solid and perfect finish appearance and at the same time allow and provide for a proper filling behind the finished front.

Another object is to provide a tile that will help to retain even the finest and thinnest seam material between adjoining tiles.

Other objects will appear from the following description and appended claims as well as from the accompanying drawing, in Which Fig. 1 is a fragmentary cross section of two adjoining fiat-type tiles showing the typical arrangement at joints between tiles.

Fig. 2 is a fragmentary cross section of a slightly modified form of joint interconnection.

Fig. 3 is a front elevation of a typical upright corner tile.

Fig. 4 is a perspective view of an upper edge tile, having the one end edge or flange cut away to illustrate the thin material.

Fig. 5 is a front elevation of a typical square tile.

Fig. 6 is a front elevation of a typical hexagonal tile.

Though tiles are and can be used for many purposes and no limitation is meant by the following, it must, nevertheless, be said that tiles referred to here are particularly used as and for a covering and ornamentation for walls and 40 floors.

Tiles of this sort are commonly applied to or over a plastic base such as cement. However, it is quite troublesome to make sure that the whole space behind the tiles and between the tile-cov- 4 ering and the cement base is filled with a bonding material, or, in other words, that the tiles are applied so that no air pockets remain between the tiles and the base.

Any air pockets left behind any tile have the tendency to form the beginning from which the tile will gradually work itself loose entirely, for one thing, and, for another thing, any pocket behind a tile naturally cannot be said to sup- 55 port the tile, or form a, proper backing in case of any sort of pressure or hit on the front face of the tile, and a badly supported tile is more easily damaged than a well supported one.

Tiles are usually provided with a coating that will easily become damaged, and any bending of any tiles by reason of the fact that there are air pockets behind the tiles, of course, may readily result in a chipping of parts of the coating.

Bonding material that is best suited for any mounting of tiles, on the other hand, is not so easily applied to any base so evenly to assure a snug fitting of a tile, and, besides, the back of a tile is not necessarily even, so that it would be necessary to apply the bonding material quite according to the unevenness of the back side of the tile.

Tiles more commonly in use, moreover, absorb moisture from the bonding material, and the base material also does its part to dry the bonding material very quickly, so that it is essential to bring the common-type tile quick enough in place before the bonding material is too dry or, in other words, with the common type of tile, all a person can do is, as a rule, to bring the tile into alignment, that is its face flush with the faces of adjoining tiles that already are in place besides aligning the edges, and then assume that the bonding material behind the newly placed tile has been good enough to spread out evenly and so as to fully cover the space back of the tile. At least, a person does not seem to have any sure way of telling whether the bonding material did just that.

It must be kept in mind that with the commonly used tiles the bonding material cannot even be applied too wet since in that condition it would simply run out from the commonly smooth back and around the smooth edges of such tiles.

Coming then to the present device, all of the above-mentioned objectional features are easily avoided by means provided in this new type of tiles.

As illustrated in Figs. 5 and 6, a tile is made of thin sheet material, and along all of the edges flanges project rearwardly, whereby even rather wet or liquid bonding material can be held within the hollow back of the tile. Provisions having been made, nevertheless, that surplus bonding material can escape, so as to assure a fully filled back when the tile is brought into proper place, only the surplus having been allowed to escape.

In Fig. 4 also, it should be noticed that there are flanges along all edges, the bottom flange at 1, the top flange at 8, the end flange at 9, and at the end In the flange having merely been cut away in order to show the thin material of the tile in cross section at this end.

Each and any and every one of such flanges, or at suitable points of a combination of flanges around an eventually peculiarly shaped tile, a desirable number of escape means are provided by which surplus bonding material can escape from behind a tile while the tile is brought into proper position.

In Figs. 1 and 2 such escape means have been illustrated in detail, however, the tile material has been shown rather thick, which was merely for the purpose of allowing a proper showing of the cross section of this tile and, particularly this escape means.

In the form of Fig. 1, an incision H is made near the front of the tile and, extending therefrom rearwardly, short incisions 12 free a portion of the tile to be bent inwardly as at I3, forming a slot or opening l4 through which surplus bonding material may escape in the direction of the arrow 15, first towards the space between adjoining tiles, and, then, outwardly in the direction of the arrow IS.

The slightly modified form of Fig. 2, provides the incisions I la and 2a., to function and give the same result in general, however, the free lip is bent outwardly as plainly illustrated at 13a.

Though surplus bonding material may eventually escape from one form as well as from the other, the form in Fig. 1 allows a closer fitting of the adjoining tiles.

With this arrangement, the escape means can be as close as possible to the front of the tile so as' to assure that air trapped near the back side of the tile in front of the bonding material and within the enclosing flanges of the tile may escape first before and with the escaping surplus bonding material.

Of course, it must be understood that the escapement means do not have to be in the particular form but may as well be composed of a suitable number of small and narrow lips, eventually made by half-round punches instead of by flat punches necessary for the elongated lips indicated in Figs. 1 and 2.

As already hinted, the whole tile is preferably made of thin sheet material, with a front body l1 and the edge-flanges l8, the escapement means to be in these edge-flanges, as clearly illustrated.

Not only that the escapement means serve to allow an escaping of air and surplus bonding ma terial, it must also be clear from the showing in Figs. 1 and 2, that any seam material, even the finest line will be locked between adjoining tiles by the simple fact that the apertures of the escapements allow some of the seam material to enter and thereby form enlarged portions that cannot very well get out from between the adjoining tiles.

It must be understood that seam material is sometimes desired of different color than the bonding material behind the tile, and, for ornamental purposes anyway ,'-any color scheme with respect to the seams can readily be arranged in this manner. Preparatory to applying the seam material, the escaped bonding material is naturally removed first, and preferably while the bonding material is soft enough and while it is coming out.

When speaking of thin sheet metal, which could, of course, include pressed or stamped sheet metal, it should be understood that these new tiles can be made of any suitable material desired or required for the purposes indicated, and that these tiles could just as well be made entirely of glass, the principal point at issue being that tiles have some sort of hollow space between some sort of rearwardly extending flange-like portions, for which the newly disclosed escapement means are of such value and for such purposes as set forth here.

It must then also be understood that the escapement means, besides serving as a locking means for the seam material, serve also as a locking means for the tiles themselves, inasmuch as any bonding material will be forced into these escapement means so as to hold any tile locked to any base upon which the tiles are applied.

Having thus described my invention, I claim l. A tile made of thin sheet material having a front body of which the rear side is designed to seat upon bonding material so as to form the solid surface material for the bonding material,

portions integral with and extending from the body rearwardly for cutting into and thereby becoming embedded in the bonding material, and escape means in the portions in form of stamped in pieces cut sufliciently so that uncut adjoining portions project in bends towards one side of the first-named portions and thereby leaving apertures through which surplus bonding material may escape from behind the body towards the outside while the first-named portions are forced into the bonding material until the body becomes seated snugly.

2. A tile made of thin sheet material having a front body of which the rear side is designed to seat upon bonding material so that the body forms the solidly bonded surface material for the underlying bonding material, flanges integral with and extending from the body rearwardly and designed for cutting into and thereby becoming embedded in the bonding material, and escape means in the flanges in form of stampedin portions cut sufficiently so that the uncut adjoining portions project in bends towards one side of the flanges to such an extent as to leave and form apertures in the flanges through which surplus bonding material may escape from behind the body towards the outside while the flanges are forced into the bonding material until the body becomes seated snugly, the escape means being furthermore designed to form locking means for the tile with respect to the bonding material and for other material disposed in the narrow seams between adjoining tiles.

O'I'I'O A. STEUER. 

